Banned.

While in the States, Nathan and I realized how much we are tied to our phones. Neither of us is the picture of the stereotypical businessman who checks his phone every five minutes and is always talking/emailing about work on it, but we do act as if our precious little iPhones are something like security blankets. Heck, I even sleep with mine under my pillow on occasion. The point is we weren’t able to use our phones as phones for six weeks while we were in America, nor could we access the Internet on them unless hooked up to a Wi-Fi network (aka my parents’ house in my case or at the DFAC in Nathan’s case). And it was nice to not have this constant phone-checking going on. I hit up my Facebook app millions of times per day and Nathan is always looking at soccer news and scores. I also sometimes open my email on my phone, just to see if I have something new. Nevermind the fact that I have it set to automatically collect my mail and chime when it enters my Inbox… We hadn’t fully realized it, but it was ridiculous. So in light of our little reality check, Nathan suggested we institute “No Computer/Cell Phone” Days. I was all for it. And so, we have had a handful of days {mostly} free of technology since we have been back. There are exceptions to our ban days. Nathan has to use the computer at work and for his online class, and we agreed that watching a movie or TV show online together is permissible. We are also able to make phone calls and text on the phone. We pretty much only contact each other anyway and it’s mostly to coordinate me picking him up from work or asking one another to pick something up at the store. And the occasional “I love you” text : ) So far, it hasn’t been hard. I just find myself constantly thinking in my free time, “Oh, I should check Facebook/Pinterest/my email.” Then I have to catch myself and think of something else to do. Like read! I have two books I am reading right now—Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins and Classic Christianity by Bob George—and I am not picking them up as often as I could because my default activity is to get online. Pathetic.

Thankfully, our relationship/communication/time spent with each other hasn’t suffered from our annoying habits. Not in any significant ways at least. We just figure the aforementioned habits aren’t desirable, in ourselves or each other, so we should squish them. And sooner rather than later.

Hopefully we will completely deprogram ourselves and stop incessantly opening apps and staring at screens. In the meantime, don’t freak out if we don’t respond via Facebook or email right away on some days. We are probably going on a walk through the nearby fields or watching some John Wayne together instead of continuously hitting the Refresh button.